Lindsayism.com

Smug is the Worst. I Hate Smug.

I don't ever read Pitchfork but a friend just sent me their Aeroplane post. Maybe it has good parts after the intro, but here's where I stopped reading and will never return:

"I love it to death, myself-- cried when I first listened to the promo cassette and everything."

Just so everyone knows: whoever that guy is did not buy Aeroplane in a store after hearing about it from friends or reading about it like the rest of us. He had the promo cassette, and it's very important that we all know that in the context of a sentence that is ostensibly humble/self deprecating. Barf.

Stephen Colbert is a Huge Neutral Milk Hotel Fan!

What are three of our favorite things?

Stephen Colbert
Neutral Milk Hotel
My Friend Stephanie aka "Stiff" (if you know her)

Last week, Stephanie went to see The Colbert Report live. What follows is an instant-message re-enactment of our real-life conversation after the show:

Me: How was Colbert?
Stephanie: AMAZING!!! OH MY GOD STEPHEN SANG NEUTRAL MILK HOTEL TO ME!
Me: What?? (Beatlemania screaming face, actual screaming, etc)

Here are the facts as we know them. Between segments, the Neutral Milk Hotel song "Holland 1945" came on (as, apparently, it often does) and Stephanie began absentmindedly lip-synching along to it. A few seconds into the song, she realized Stephen was pointing at her and singing along. According to witnesses, Stephen and Stephanie continued to sing along to the song while making eye contact for over a minute until their reverie was interrupted by the end of the commercial break. During this time, Stephen:

- Appeared to know all of the words to the song.
- Moved his head to look around a producer when his eye contact with Stephanie was briefly blocked.
- Acknowledged his and Stephanie's mutual understanding of the sad nature of the song, which is about Anne Frank, by making a "sad face" and tracing the motion of an invisible tear down his cheek. Stephanie, in kind, mimicked this motion back to Stephen.

In Stephanie's words: "I can die now."

Geoff, a sketch comedian who attended the show with Stephanie and witnessed the event, had this to say:

"It was magical. Neutral Milk Hotel was playing, Stephanie was singing, I was singing. Then I looked up and noticed Stephen was singing. Then I saw that he was singing in my general direction, so I looked to my right and realized that he and Stephanie were singing to each other. So I told Stephanie, "Hey, Stephen Colbert is singing to you!" and she did her best job of shushing me while continuing to sing Neutral Milk Hotel with Stephen. I was about 15 seconds behind on all fronts. But still, pretty awesome."

Here is our very most favorite picture of Stephen:

And here is the song: Download 06_holland_1945.m4a by Neutral Milk Hotel.

The world just screams and falls apart!!

Jeff Mangum Finds a Beautiful Face in this Place That is Circling All 'Round the Sun

...presumably, because he just got married. I know that the 14 fellow extreme NMH fans who read this site wish him congratulations too! (But something tells me that Jeff isn't the Google Alert type.)

(Thanks to Jeff from heartonastick for the tip)

Score the Sopranos Last Scene with Any MP3

If you're like me, you frequently become enraged at the way the internet controls your life. You have no need for a "boss button" because the entire effing web is your boss button and and you long for the simplicity of a blank Excel document or, even better, a cabin in the woods off the grid and untouched by the medium that simultaneously feeds and destroys you like the semen of one of Angelina Jolie's ex boyfriends.

But then, some days, you see something this unbelievably awesome and you're just like "Wow. I love you, Internet!"

UPDATE: What a beautiful dream that could flash on the screen in a blink of an eye and be gone: It doesn't sync well and ends too early, but the juxtaposition with Aeroplane made my neurons fire like crazy. Just paste this in on Stereogum.
(Thanks to Jen, obvs!)

there is, however, no excuse for celine dion

There's an interesting little "debate" on Emily's site about The Mountain Goats. While I of course disagree, I like the way Emily framed it - in the respectful way I expect of one of the most curious and open people I've ever met. We all have bands that all our friends love but that we don't - there are several people who can bear witness to the fact that I hated Neutral Milk Hotel's In the Aeroplane Over the Sea for the first 20 listens (I even, to my shame, perfected an impression). And now it's my favorite record of all time.

And as long as it's confession time, Bob Dylan? Fully and completely aware of his brilliance and importance but just not able to listen. And don't even get me started on mainstream hip hop - that debate always ends with me in tears (and all I ever argue is that one's taste in music cannot be PC or not PC!)  Shouldn't music, like food or (legal) sex, be completely unpolitical? You don't criticize a person for disliking avocados, even though avocados rule. You just feel a little sorry for them that they've missed out on the pleasure avocados have added to your own life.

(But all that said, that "titanica" commenter kind of has a point.)

senseless acts of beauty

(photo of rough drafts of charades lists by Jen.)
Quick Vermont Highlights:

1. You know how they say you should find the thing you love the most and that you're best at and then figure out a way to get paid for it? Well, unfortunately for me, it appears that my thing is "Charades."
7 people. 4 hours. Most. Fun. I've. Ever. Had. In. My. Entire. Life. Solemn vows have been made about making it a "regular thing", which would improve my life 100%.

2. You know what's fun? Going to the Applebees off exit 26 of I-91 with your friends on a Saturday night and sending a round of drinks over to a (slightly bewildered) random table.

3. You know what's supremely dorky but also worth a year of therapy? Going off by yourself at 3 am on a mountain and looking up at the stars while listening to In the Aeroplane Over the Sea in its entirety. I was having such a great time I threw on some On Avery Island (Song Against Sex, natch) and Mountain Goats at the end. It was enough to make me almost want to ditch the city for the land of Cars 'n' Stars.

Okay, now some value-adding links. You've suffered enough:

* I thought the headline was funny, but then two separate people urged me to read the entire thing, and they were right: When This Meth Thing Blows Over, You'll Come Crawling Back, by Cocaine

* Kids steal fake pot from billboard promoting Showtime's "Weeds":

(via Golden Fiddle)

* THE comprehensive analysis of the famous self-regard of aforementioned blogger Jaqueline Mackie Paisley Passey. (Includes a photo of her most recent bullet-dodging boyfriend!)